Hi everyone, I’m looking to get a video doorbell which is blocked from cloud access, connected instead to a local NVR but without losing remote view completely - I’m not new to CCTV or smart homes, but I am to Homey, so I just wanted to get some recommendations on specific integrations.
I assume any of the Reolink/Eufy types would connect to an NVR (Or something like Synology Surveillance Station) as long as they support ONVIF or if it’s their own brand NVR. I want the doorbell press to a) ring a local chime (I assume this would work regardless) and b) trigger a routine in Homey - Not sure this would be supported in an NVR so presumably Homey will have to connect direct to the doorbell?
I then want that routine to send push notifications to mobile phones to allow the mobile to connect to the video stream from the NVR, not from the Doorbell camera.
Has anyone done anything similar and have any particular recommendations or pitfalls to specific brands?
Eufy cameras work great in Homey. They record locally to your HomeBase, so you don’t have any recurring fees. There’s also local AI detections, so you don’t have to pay for those either. I currently only have the Solar Wall Light Cam but I’m also installing a Eufy doorbell soon.
I have Reolink PoE doorbell connected directly to an NVR, via PoE switch
I have a doorbell chime also (part of a bundle)
I have a few reolink cameras, so that is why I went with this doorbell
It works as its supposed to in the reolink app, as does the chime
Throw Homey into the mix, I do the following:
When doorbell is pressed, send a whatsapp group a ‘snapshot’ (still image only) So I can instantly see who is there - this is also what the app does, but within the app you can enable two way audio and talk to the person as any video doorbell. I didnt find a way to do this is Homey, so I just use the reolink app if I want to talk to whoever turns up because that also notifies me
The chime works anyway, but I have also set up Alexa to announce that someone is at the door
Apps required for Homey:
Reolink
Whatsapp (group) - add your other house members
Alexa
Other things I played with, but havent got a permanent flow for:
On motion detect, send snapshot of what is there to my whatsapp group - resulted in loads of false positives, so took it off
On motion, and if its dark turn on spotlight (another Reolink camera that overlooks entire driveway)
the idea here was to provide light, but I found I could do that with any light, and the amount of false positives using the doorbell meant my light was like a disco all night
So in summary, it does all you require and then some. Perhaps the exception is viewing the doorbells video through a Homey flow as there are only cards for ‘snapshot’ which is just a still image - unless you can find an ONVIF type app and use that somehow? (doorbell has ONVIF as I had it into Frigate at one point)
Reolink wifi 12V powered doorbell + chime - connected directly to HA & Homey per Onvif integration/app. SD card for offline recordings.
It’s all local only, I blocked all related DNS requests and all’s working.
I don’t get the “local AND remote” part by the way.
When I want to check live cam footage, I use my VPN to connect to my LAN
Why would you want to block internet access to a device? I get why you might not want to pay for cloud storage, but I don’t understand why you would want to block the connection altogether. The device then doesn’t receive any (security updates, which can be risky (to use on your main network at least). You also won’t be able to change configuration of the device (that works via the cloud, right?)
I temporary allow internet when needed, for the occasional update.
I just don’t like devices, especially cams, trying to connect (and send data I didn’t allow) to god knows what.
Configuration and image viewing/storing is all done via LAN, Sven. Otherwise I wouldn’t even consider buying it.
From many of your other posts I see you trust cloud (companies) 100%, but I just really don’t.
Yes, but most don’t allow updating from a file (none that I’ve seen at least, except for the very old cameras which didn’t even have any mobile app yet). So you can manually click “Check for updates” (in Eufy and Tapo at least, don’t know about other brands) and manually update from the server, but it does need cloud connectivity for that (I think the P2P video stream can be blocked though, likely only signaling channel and OTA server are needed for that, but I’m not sure since I allow everything to access the internet unrestricted).
